Ultra-Right Pakistan Party Vows Comeback

The leader of an ultra-right Pakistan party infamous for sometimes bloody anti-blasphemy agitation has vowed a comeback after its vote share evaporated in elections last week.

Blasphemy is a charged topic in Muslim-majority Pakistan where the faintest whisper of a slight toward the Prophet Muhammad can embolden lynch mobs.

Saad Hussain Rizvi's Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) party rode the issue to emerge the largest Islamist force in 2018 polls, but its prominence was all but eroded in last week's national and provincial elections.

Analysts say the death of Rizvi's charismatic father, who founded the party, and a loss of patronage from Pakistan's powerful generals cost them dearly.

Speaking to supporters in the center of cultural capital Lahore, Rizvi said the enemies of Islam had stopped his party.

"This rigging has taken place because we speak about rights, and we talk about a faith that those with power in this world do not accept," he said.

"Bringing people onto the streets, and bringing people out to vote was not a problem for TLP in the past and it is not a problem now."

The crowd of 2,000 people there to hear him speak -- though enthusiastic -- was a far cry from the tens of thousands that used to hang on to his father's every word.

TLP has its ideological roots in Barelvi Islam -- a mainstream sect traditionally seen as moderate but for which blasphemy is a red line.

It first began making waves in 2016, when protesting the execution of Mumtaz Qadri, a bodyguard who assassinated the governor of Punjab province over his stance on blasphemy.

Analysts say its street power was tapped by the military a year later to reduce the voter base of Nawaz Sharif's center-right party, which had fallen foul of the generals.